Camiel Doorenweerd

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I study the evolutionary drivers that shaped the diversity of four species rich genera of leaf-mining moths. In the above picture I am searching for undescribed species in a rare Taiwanese beech forest (Fagus hyatae) that is currently only found at mid altitude mountain ridges in a few localities in Taiwan but has had a wider distribution in a cooler climate in the past. (Photo by Shipher Wu)

Keywords

Current research topics

Ectoedemia heringi.

Tiny plant eating moths: leaf miners

The moths I use to study evolutionary processes are present everywhere but noticed by few. The word "moth" is commonly associated with the buggers that eat the clothes in your closet or your expensive rug. However, the vast majority of the estimated 300,000 species of moths worldwide would never touch your clothes; they feed on plants. There are moths with a wingspan of over 30cm, but the moths that have caught my interest have wingspans of 0.3 to 1.5cm. The caterpillars of these moths are so tiny they can actually live inside the leaves of plants and are referred to as leaf miners. This ecological group of species is comprised of different moth genera and families that have evolved independently. Unique to this group is their ultimately intimate relationship with their hosts plants, requiring them to be highly host-specific. A single species will feed on a single host plant species only, or at most some that are closely related. Moreover, closely related mining species will often be found on closely related plant species.

Scanning the fossil record

Leaf-mining moths include some of the oldest lineages of moths with fossils of leaf-mine traces going back 102 million years ago (Cretaceous), meaning that they were already present and abundant when the dinosaurs were around. By studying leaf-mine traces on fossilized leaves as well as Amber fossils with micro CT scanning we attempt to calibrate the molecular phylogenies.

DNA barcoding and interactive keys

DNA barcoding is a taxonomic tool invaluable to my research an applied on different groups, also outside the groups of my focus mentioned below. Because there are vast numbers of undescribed species, the wealth of data of COI barcodes aids for faster species delineation. By developing interactive keys for the groups we work on, we hope to gain more knowledge on the distribution of species, while at the same time allowing more people to identify species that would normally go to one of the few worlds' specialists of those groups.

Comparative phylogenetics

By studying their DNA, a reconstruction will be made of how four different lineages of moths were able to colonize different host plants in an era where the continents were forming, ice-ages came and went, forests developed and disappeared, and the flowering plants flourished. The results from this study will help to understand how moths were able to become so diverse.

The four genera that will be compared:

Stigmella (Nepticulidae), 350 species known

Ectoedemia (Nepticulidae), 212 species known

Phyllonorycter (Gracillariidae), 600 species known

Cameraria (Gracillariidae), 102 species known

A larva of Stigmella hybnerella, mining in a leaf of the common hawthorn, Crataegus monogyna.

Collaborations

There is close collaboration with many Dutch and international collegues, primarily lepidopterologists. International connections include collegues in Finland, France, Great-Britain, Australia, USA, Taiwan and Japan.